Today at Brown

Rebecca Molholt was on all fours with a toothbrush in hand when she was introduced to one of her research specialties — mosaics. As a summer intern at the Worcester Art Museum, she was helping clean a collection of mosaics excavated in the 1930s from Antioch, Turkey.

“It was a very hands-on introduction and I think that experience prompted me to always consider the role of tactility,” she said. “Whenever you are looking at a Roman mosaic, you are probably standing on it and touching it at the same time. The contrariness of the experience is akin to looking at a painting while pressing your palm to the canvas.”

After graduating from Clark University with a B.A. in art history, Molholt received an M.A. from the Graduate Program in the History of Art at Williams College in 1996 and a Ph.D. from Columbia University in 2008. Her dissertation suggests alternative methodologies for the study of Roman floor mosaics. Molholt comes to Brown from the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., where she has been a David E. Finley Fellow since 2005. Most recently, she served as a curatorial associate on the Gallery’s upcoming exhibition, Pompeii and the Roman Villa. She has also worked as an exhibition curator at the Douglas Cooley Memorial Art Gallery at Reed College and the Sterling & Francine Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass.

While Molholt loves working in a museum environment not only for the collaborative opportunities it presents but also because it lets her be “omnivorous, in a way,” she says, “Nothing beats teaching on site and right in front of objects.” She has been awarded several fellowships for travel in Spain, Italy, Tunisia, and Turkey and has led on-site seminar tours in Rome. She recalled memorable moments, such as when she was almost hit by lightening while discussing Julius Caesar in the Roman Forum and the time she got to lie down on the floor of the Sistine Chapel to stare up at Michelangelo’s ceiling. She also appreciates what she learns from fellow travelers.

“I’ve been lucky enough to travel with architects, archaeologists, and artists and well as art historians. It’s fantastic to hear what a painter will say when looking at an architectural façade or what strikes a composer while looking at fresco painting … the range of insights has been both humbling and inspiring.”